5 posts from November 2012

November 28, 2012

There's a new report/essay out from Columbia Journalism School's Tow Centre for Digital Journalism that I recommend as required reading for anyone interested in contemporary media, how we got here and insight into navigating the future.

The report is a well-organized read about the trends, economics and practicalities of old and new media. It offers much to think about and discuss. You can link to the report here: Post-Industrial Journalism.

I've been through the report twice and continue to mine it for history and advice. I love how it's sectioned and find the commentary is fair, reasonable and thoughtful. We've heard much lately about disruption theory, now I suspect we'll be hearing more about a dynamic described in the report as "post-industrial journalism." Here's a description of the term from the report's authors:

"Post-industrial journalism assumes that the existing institutions are
going to lose revenue and market share, and that if they hope to retain
or even increase their relevance, they will have to take advantage of
new working methods and processes afforded by digital media.

This restructuring will mean rethinking every organizational aspect
of news production–increased openness to partnerships; increased
reliance on publicly available data; increased use of individuals,
crowds and machines to produce raw material; even increased reliance on
machines to produce some of the output."

Joshua Benton, writing for the Nieman Journalism Lab does a concise job of distilling the report and pulling out highlights. You can read his post here.

November 21, 2012

This year, Amanda Lindhout's Global Enrichment Foundation opened a literacy school for female Somali refugees in Kenya. GEF also started She Will which offers therapy and education to rape survivors.
(Photo by Riccardo Gangale and sourced from Hiiraan.com a website with news and information about Somalia.)

Amanda Lindhout is a story-teller, survivor of the lengthiest kidnapping in Canadian history and bridge-builder. She is a passionate advocate of human rights and is a poster child for the power of forgiveness. At 31-years-old, Amanda Lindhout is many things, but she is not a journalist, and now, she is not afraid to say so.

As a young woman in her 20's, Lindhout travelled the world, visiting more than 50 countries, seeing, touching and experiencing local culture. She travelled as a freelance journalist and sold stories here and there to broadcast outlets and a column to her home paper, The Red Deer Advocate.

She was inexperienced, unprepared and without proper training or former journalism credentials. In 2008 after spending eight months in Iraq, she wanted to explore the stories in a Somalia refugee camp, a place where millions of people were starving and displaced because of civil war. She went to a country some deemed to be among the most dangerous places in the world, at a time when large media organizations refused to send staff.

Outside Mogadishu in August, 2008 Lindhout was captured and taken hostage and held captive for 15 months, being released after ransom cash was paid. Her ordeal is horrific, even unimaginable, and she now works to bring education and empowerment to people in Somalia. She's forgiven her captors saying she believes they are victims of their own environment. Much has been written about Lindhout, her experience and her work (see Need to know links below).

Today I had the privilege of listening to her powerful and upsetting story about hurt, fear and forgiveness as the keynote speaker (see Spec.com video) of the YMCA Peace Medal breakfast. After her talk, we discussed journalism and her role as a freelance journalist. There are many times when I am approached by young journalists or people who aspire to be foreign correspondents or globe-trotter reporters. Amanda talks about some of those issues in this short video interview:

I also asked her about the role of media in conflict zones:

Amanda Lindhout - need to know:

Was working as a freelance journalist when taken hostage in Aug. 2008 by teenaged Islamic militants in Somalia. She spent 15 months - 460 days in captivity.

A book, A House in the Sky, about her ordeal (it's billed as a memoir) is due out next summer. Lindhout was taken hostage with a photojournalist and man she describes as ex-boyfriend. Australian Nigel Brennan published a book about his experience. It was released in 2011 and called, The Price of Life.

November 15, 2012

Memorable storytelling takes different forms. Long-form narrative, column, theatre, song and video as we saw in Private Riley, and in one my ritual stops for slices of life stories, the daily obits page. Some time ago I flagged the obit of Fred (Fred's Dead and Dogs Liked Him). Today another gem from the pages of today's passings:

James (Dale) Reid was quite aware of his pending date with the afterlife and upond his death instructed his family to run the following obit. I've never met Dale Reid, but get a sense of his personality. Here's a snippet of the obit he wrote:

(Died) "of complications caused by his wife and children making him old before his time. Dale Reid in his 67th year. Husband of Mary (Marlene). Father of Kim Chapman (Kent), Darlene
Ahenakew (Lee) and Amber Adams (Colin). Grumpy to six superior
grandchildren. During his life Dale was a Scout leader, softball coach,
church steward, a member of Glanbrook Home Support, Blackheath Binbrook
Lions, Local 1005 USWA, and a lifelong supporter of the New Democratic
Party. In lieu of flowers, please send a nasty letter to a
Conservative".

Family man, acerbic, wry and political. After reading his obit, I get a sense of Dale. In 72 compact words, his story lives.

November 13, 2012

I wrote last week of the captivating and innovative storytelling
Mark McNeil and others in our newsroom put into telling the story of a Hamilton soldier and his
regiment. A powerful tale told from a unique perspective: a music video.

Mark turned a story into song, photographer Barry
Gray turned it into a video, editors turned all that into another newspaper story
and then all of it a special section. The full story about Private Riley, can
be viewed on the Spec’s website here and an interview about the song and series can
be heard on CBC’s As It Happens with Carol Off and Jeff Douglas.

I was thinking about Private Riley and the power of Mark’s work as
I entered Hamilton’s
Theatre Aquarius to watch and listen to another story. A full four days after
seeing Kevin Loring’s Where the Blood Mixes, I remain amazed and still somewhat
numb at the power and depth of that piece of live theatre and the incredible
performance.

Where the Blood Mixes is primarily about how a residential school affected
a community, in particular two families. It's stark, bleak, emotional, riveting
and, like Mark McNeil's Private Riley, a unique piece of journalism.

We have newspapers and tablets and digital on steroids.
Smart phones and wireless and minicams and apps galore. There’s no arguing we’ve
entered a new age of storytelling, but as always, it’s always about the story.

Spec reporter Mark McNeil has long written about Hamilton’s history and
the RHLI’s.

Earlier this year he wrote about Private James Henry
Morrison, who died in 1866 and is marked as being the RHLI’s first fatality.

Mark got thinking about the 17-year-old RHLI and believed there was a deeper to story to be told. Mark is
creative, contemporary and understands the power of good storytelling. So he
wrote a song. For the newspaper.

That song, Private Riley, is the paper’s first-ever music
video and the words, photos and videography tells a national story. Marks sing and plays the song and is accompanied by a 37-piece military band. The work is impressive and moving.

The video composition by Mark and photographer Barry Gray are excellent
and they are first-rate examples of how a contemporary newspaper continues to
evolve in a multimedia world.